Healing Each Other
by Ashlynn Lilacflower
Summary: Luna Lovegood scales the astronomy tower once in a while, just to look at the beautiful, twinkling stars. One night on the tower, she hears Neville climbing the stairs as well. Luna/Neville one-shot.


**Author's Note:**Hey everyone! This is my third posted HP fanfic - I have one written and typed that you'll get to see on the morn of the 25th of December. :) I'd like to say thanks to all the reviewers of my previous two Harry Potter fics. :D

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or the setting. If I did I'd be one of the richest women in the world.

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_We think about our parents and the horrible things that have happened to them. We talk about them sometimes._

_Muggles call it something like "group therapy."_

I was staring up at the stars that night on the astronomy tower, just wondering about their formations. Marveling at the bright, tinkling lights up there in the sky – that's what I was doing when he walked up the stairs. I recognized his footsteps.

"Hello, Neville," I said without turning. I heard him pause in his step.

"Hi, Luna."

This time I spun around, though slowly. His voice was alarming – thick with something. "Neville?"

And then I saw his face. It was almost shining in the so-very-pale light of the moon and stars, glistening with tears as he stared up at the night sky. His voice must be thick with those tears.

"My mum used to tell me stories about these stars," I said. I walked forward and took his hand, leading him to the edge of the tower. "She said they were so beautiful it was like, well, magic."

Neville wiped one cheek with the sleeve of his robes. "My mum tells me stories about the moon when I visit her... She lost herself underneath it when Bellatrix Lestrange took her mind away from her."

I looked up at him. His tears had completely filled his eyes now. I wiped them off his face with my own sleeve; I could feel them soaking through it. "Stars are happy, Neville. They get to play with the moon all night. So the moon is happy, too."

He sniffed. "I try to be happy, but it just doesn't work sometimes. You know how that is, right Luna?" he asked.

"Yes. I miss my mother, too… But I do have Da, after all. And you have your friends and your grandmother. We both have something to hold on to, don't we?"

Neville shrugged. He had stopped crying, but one last teardrop rolled unhurriedly down his cheek. "Sometimes, even something to hold on to isn't enough, Luna."

I let his hand go and hugged him tightly. "You're so sad…" I murmured in his ear. "I wish you could be happy, like the stars are tonight."

We stood there like that for a long time. It could have been minutes or hours. Eventually, he accepted my embrace and wrapped his arms around me, tangling his fingers in my moon-washed hair. He rested his chin on the top of my head.

"There's one thing you can do for me," he muttered some time later. "Can you tell me a story about the stars? I'm tired of hearing about the moon from my parents."

I struggled for words. "Of-of course, Neville. Do you know the story of Aries?" I asked. It was one of the stories I knew well.

"No."

I had to think hard before telling him this story. It was one that could make or break his night. I let go of him slowly, carefully, taking his fingers out of my hair one by one. I sat down on the tower wall behind me and looked up at the stars, searching for the great ram's horns. "There he is," I said, pointing up at the winking constellation. "That's him."

Neville nodded and sat on the wall next to me. "So what did he do? Why is he up there with all the other stars?"

"I don't know why he's actually up there, but Aries was the ram that had a pelt of gold."

Neville looked at me incredulously. "_Aries_ had the Golden Fleece?"

I nodded. "He was skinned for it, but it can heal almost anything." I looked at him pointedly, but he was staring up at the night sky. "I've heard that it could even bring back love to a damaged heart, but I don't know how true that is."

Neville shook his head. "No, I think you're right. If the story can heal my heart a little, than the Fleece itself would do wonders."

We were silent.

A while later, he asked what the Gemini brothers did.

"Castor and Pollux stole cattle," I said blandly, too intent on the stars at that point to really notice what I'd said.

"Oh."

Castor and Pollux were one of the closest signs to his own, which was Cancer. I realized my mistake a little too late – I'd made him feel unimportant yet again. Our companionable silence turned into a complete one. I grimaced at myself and stretched out on the wall. I didn't have to worry about falling off of it – the wall was thicker than I was tall.

Eventually, Neville lay down too.

We lay in the quiet the rest of the night, just listening to the crickets as they sung their songs. When the sun rose, we flipped over onto our stomachs to watch the sky turn first to a dull gray and then to beautiful pinks, blues, purples, oranges – gorgeous, lovely colors.

And then the breakfast bell rang and we bolted down the stairs as fast as we could, he heading for the Gryffindor tower and I heading for the Ravenclaw tower.

_I love the stars now, as well as the moon. _

_Luna taught me happiness and I have taught her to have faith and to never lose it._

It's routine now. We scale the astronomy tower every night and fall asleep either on the tower or its wall.

And we've never gotten caught.

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_Please review! :)_


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